Japow!

04/12/2010

Howdy! Its your boy Koo reporting from N-town down!! Its been a pretty quiet first few days in Niseko, the hill hasn’t been open yet so we have been very busy getting to know each other in our house. More and more people are arriving in drips and drabs and the house is filling up to its capacity of 27 which is great. Other amazing news in Tom Summerville from the Turoa crew has managed to secure a job with us at NBS and should be arriving in the next couple of weeks!!
Right now I am missing out on a fun night out at the opening of Wild Bills, because I have successfully managed to tweak my knee doing nothing more than jumping a step and landing awkwardly on my left knee. I am a little bit worried as my left knee has been troubling me for a while now, all the way through New Zealand and even with the short break between seasons I have managed to give it a tweak. We don’t start on snow for a couple of days and we have a day off tomorrow however with the hill not open and there being no I don’t think I am missing out on too much. Hopefully a bit of rest will help. I think the I might have swam a little too hard in the pool last night and just wore it out, then with all the walking around town last night it might have not enjoyed it.
We went out for a couple of drinks in bars around Niseko and I found out today that the place has about 30 nightclubs/bars which is pretty insane! The one thing I noticed when I was out what how commercial the place was, loads of Geijin (foreign) people and not many Japanese it was crazy. We are definitely in the “Whistler” of Japanese resorts – its insane. The night out we had was a lot of fun, but at then end I went for a leap across a piece of mud and thats where the knee incident happened. Soul destroying – hopefully I will get better the icing is helping and Like I said there are a couple more days of training indoor and I have a day off tomo so just rest – perfect opportunity to work on the manual. Ill try to get up super early tomo and get some shit done for sure. I am looking to try and have the CASI LEVEL 3 manual ready for review by Rob and Matt for tomorrow! See how it goes.
Another fun night was Rach’s birthday. I decided to share a bottle of Vodka with Chloe to celebrate and it was a super fun night we played loads of drinking games, loads of people turned up met new faces and really good banter. One of the highlights was when Tammy one of the chefs who works for Ski Japan came over and made up super authentic sushi – it was delicious.
Other than those fun times, we have been in Staff induction training which was pretty thorough. We spent a day going through the staff policy handbook and just got to know more people.
I have been swimming to keep up the fitness and in the Hotel where we go to swim there is a traditional Japanese Onsen, this is a natural spring water hot pool in stone like baths. It was incredible! After a days riding I can imagine that would be a great place to go to help heal the body. And even more amazing is there is an outdoor balcony Onsen where you can chill in the warm water and can have a view of the cold snowy mountains! Incredible!
Right now my main concern is my knee and I am slightly worried its going to be a niggly one all season! I just gotta rest it up over the next couple of days be patient and it will be all good!
I better roll out
Much love
Koo